This year was a whirlwind, honestly, comparable to a hurricane
if you would. I started off my school year, only my second year teaching,
switching schools within my district, and changing grade levels. I went from teaching
4th to teaching 5th and trust me, there’s a noticeable difference.
Just beginning to feel somewhat comfortable in my position, our union was in
contract negotiations and we were then ordered, work-to-rule. And being the
naive teacher I was, thought nothing of it and I didn’t understand the full
implications. “Oh we only have to work during our paid hours? Sounds good to
me!” I quickly realized that is actually impossible, and it’s every
teacher’s worst nightmare.
So far, a lot of changes- new school, new grade level, and work-to-rule, and it’s only September
5th? Great. Let’s flash forward a few months, shall we? All right, so it’s
November 4th. Yes, I remember the date because this was a plot twist I wasn’t
expecting. Thankfully I have been on this Earth for 24 years, without breaking
a bone (knock-on-wood) and never needing surgery. So my body decided my
appendix was going to burst around 1 in the morning. It was a Sunday, and
school was the very next day. In a lot of pain, but also on a lot pain
medication, I nervously asked the doctor when I could return to work, and he
responded with the following, “Thursday!” Ecstatic, I communicated with my
principal that I’ll be back in no time! She responded, “yeah see ya in 6
weeks…” And she was exactly right. It was a long recovery and the worry of what
in the world could possibly be going on right now in my classroom was whirling
around in my head. The thoughts I had were, “Who is the sub in my room? Can he
or she find my generic sub plans? Are they behaving? Can they find my
emergency binder? I don’t have sub plans, wait, I really don’t have sub plans
for 6 weeks, what am I possibly going to do?!”
With all that commotion, I finally returned right before
Christmas break. You know, the most wonderful time of the year when all the
students are working hard and totally on track and behaving! I realized, not
only was I frantically a mess, so were my students. I had different subs thrown
in and out of my room, nothing was graded, my expectations were out the window,
and everyone was on different pages on what we were working on.
Beginning my third year of teaching, I have learned a lot about
myself that I don’t think I would’ve necessarily had if I had not gone into
this profession. There have been moments I’ve wanted to give up, and the days
that I went home crying considering if I was doing enough for my students.
Though, to quote Dr. Bogad, “struggle without hope is self-defeating, hope
won’t solve problems on it’s own” so I knew I needed to make a change. Looking
forward to the 2019-2020 school year I want to make some positive changes.
The hurricane is finally over and the sun will be shining again
in room 7. That is why I believe a successful academic school year is directly
correlated by creating a
student-centered hub. Here, parents and students can come for academic support,
community interaction, and collaborative learning through creation of a
classroom website. I feel as though I can meet all of the expectations I have
for myself, my students, and ultimately bridge the gap between the home and
school environment. Dana Boyd believes, “digital literacy needs to be taught, regardless of
age or background” and during the first 6 weeks of school, I plan on walking my
students step-by-step explaining our purpose for using our classroom website,
and how to use it. Not only can students access the website during school, but
they can access it at home. Just as Simon Sneck, I believe introducing my “why” and our purpose, will challenge
my students to become critical thinkers.
Technology is here, and it’s all around us. It is a fact that we
can’t run away from it, and I believe we need to embrace this in our classroom.
Before taking this course, and studying Scott Noon’s 4-Tier Model, I
categorized myself as a techno-traditionalist. Someone who accomplished simple
classroom tasks such as, Google docs, Gmail, and Google classroom, though that
was the extent! Now, I feel as if I am teetering on the line of a
techno-traditionalist and techno-constructivist. I am going to use my class website to completely reorganize the structure of my classroom. Not
only will my students have access to helpful resources for math, including
examples of what we had gone over that day, they will also have links to
helpful resources and videos that explain key content. There are different
sections for math, reading, writing, and science.
I made sure to include a link for parents. There are accessible
ways for them to contact me, a Google forum “beginning of the year” survey, as
well as helpful links for homework resources. If a student forgets what we have
for homework, or they are interested in getting ahead to see what our week
looks like, a weekly agenda will be posted as well as a monthly calendar for
upcoming tests. I had a few parents this past year that asked me to message
them a few days before we had an assessment, because their child would become
anxious. With this tool, parents will be able to access the calendar digitally
weeks before. This alleviates the stress for parents, students, and
puts the pressure on me to continually reach at my goal of staying organized.
In grade 5, we also rotate classes for Science, Social Studies,
and Writing. With that being said I created two new Google Classrooms for the
other two fifth grade rooms, for their students to access, and to help myself
stay organized in regard of who has completed what task, and what I need to
grade. Last year, returning after my surgery, it was a nightmare trying to
organize the remainder of my student’s grades- when I barely had my own 25
students covered. With the use of Google Classroom, this will lessen my stress
of where everything is, because it is all conveniently in one place.
In conclusion, just as Wesch believes, learning is an ongoing
process. I am still learning, my students are learning, and we can all learn
from one another. Creating this website is a risk, but it is a risk that I am
so excited to introduce to my future fifth graders and their families. Without
taking this course, I would have never thought of creating a website for my
classroom. I would’ve tried to organize my classroom with more paper, folders,
and filing cabinets, than I have room for. Now, I not only have my class
organized in one place, I have also organized my two other classes, for my
writing block. Having my students submit their writing pieces digitally will
save me a lot of time for grading 75 writing pieces moving forward. With that
being said, I am more motivated than ever to continue to work on this website
over the summer, and throughout the school year.
